Tuesday, May 31, 2016

Watching (Colorful) Paint Dry: Overwatch eSports Casting
Perspectives



Over the weekend I tuned into Overwatch's largest tournament to date, the "Agents Rising 10K." Held at the eSports Arena outside of Los Angeles, the eSport event featured some of the scene's most well known teams like Liquid and Cloud9 competing for the largest prize pool to date. I was excited to tune into the event, not only because I've been looking to expand my eSports viewing horizons (I've stuck mostly to fighting games and Hearthstone), but also because I have been having such a great time playing the game. Overwatch has been spectacular so far.

I will go into more detail about why I am loving Overwatch next week with a full review of the game, but one thing I'll share now is this: Overwatch is the epitome of fun. I don't mean to imply that nothing is more fun than Overwatch, but rather, Overwatch was designed from the ground up to be a problem-free fun experience. Despite the years of pain-staking work that went into making Overwatch so exceptional, there's a certain lightness that characterizes the entire experience. From characters to maps to guns to lore to everything in between, the game pops with colorful vibrancy. Overwatch is full of life. A kind of life that makes you feel better for playing it. Dark and serious and dry Overwatch is not.

You can imagine my surprise then when the Agents Rising 10K stream teetered between boring and O.K. throughout its duration. And it wasn't the gameplay. The players were pulling off crazy moves, cool strategies, dynamic team compositions. The technical side of the stream was great too -- the perspective shifting was the best yet for Overwatch in terms of making it clear what was happening. The issue was the casting. The commentary. Not even one week into the release of Overwatch and the commentary had already devolved into numb and sterile talk of strategy (what players could and/or should be doing). It's a pitfall so much of eSports has fallen into. The casters don't make the game sound fun. Hell, the casters don't even sound like they're having fun. The casting was so bad I took to Twitter to complain.


I have become so sick of this deep-thinking, overly analytic approach to eSports commentary. It plagues the Hearthstone and CS:GO scenes. If casters aren't careful, DOTA2 and LoL fall into a similar trap. What made me more angry when it comes to Overwatch was just how at odds it felt for the game itself. Overwatch is fun incarnate, filled with life and color. The drab analytics and theory crafting on the fly don't fit the game. It would be like shoutcasters at a golf event. The tonal dissonance creates an unpleasant viewing experience.

I've long compared Overwatch to fighting games, and especially after playing, the comparison feels more apt than ever. Everyone wants to claim that the characters feel like MOBA heroes. For me, they're much more similar to the fighters in SFV or Soul Calibur than anything from DOTA2. Regardless, the life and excitement of Overwatch demands some life and excitement in casting. As I noted in my tweets, the Overwatch scene could learn a lot from the fighting game community. After years of practice, the FGC has found a near perfect balance of strategy talk and hype casting. What's happening on screen is exciting, so why shouldn't the commentary be exciting and get people excited?

I only want the best for a game I love to play and I would love to watch. Overwatch is the most fun I've had with a multiplayer shooter in years. I want it to be the game that gets me into watching FPS eSports, too. But with what was on display at the Agents Rising 10K, I'm not so sure. If you're reading this and have any pull at Overwatch tournaments, local or gigantic, please put some thought into how you cast the game. eSports needs less paint drying and more paint excitedly brushed on Twitch's canvas. We would all benefit from more joy in our lives.

Because I know that playing Overwatch has brought me a ton. I'm effusive about it on TIF podcast and can play for nearly 3 hours at a time. The world could use more heroes. Specifically, better Overwatch casters. Those kind of heroes.



Friday, May 27, 2016

News & Views
5/21/16-5/27/16

Memorial Day weekend is upon us! I hope everyone has made some plans to enjoy their extra day off. I know I have. Got some movies slotted to watch with the finacée, shopping to do, and of course, more Overwatch to play. It should be a good weekend.

News & Views is your weekly dose of great gaming writing. I find great editorials, stories, essays and more and put them all into one convenient place. Check out the links below for stories about the biggest online troll in Dark Souls, how DOOM represented gaming’s punk movement, and how environmental storytelling in roguelikes can be gripping.

And of course please check out the brand new episode of The Impact Factor podcast that was posted today! You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, or if you prefer other methods, check out our SoundCloud. We’re on YouTube too!

Spotlight
Ana Valens, Kill Screen

Worth Reading
Sharang Biswas, Kill Screen

Alexandria Marie, Medium

Keith Stuart, The Guardian

Ben Kuchera, Polygon

Bruno Dias, Zam

With Comments
Delilah Sinclair, Paste
Playing Overwatch has surprised me. I thought I had moved past playing competitive online first-person shooters, but here we are. But for as much as I like the game, it has been hard putting my finger on exactly why Overwatch is so great. Perhaps the answer can be found in Delilah Sinclair’s write-up on Paste in which she details how the game creates a friendly competitive space for all.

Patrick Klepek, Kotaku
Klepek continues spotlighting some of gaming’s most fascinating stories. This first I found this week was about a notorious troll in the Dark Souls online community. Unlike so many trolls that try to kill the fun for others, Iron Pineapple is all about creating ludicrous situations that you can’t help but smile about. Iron Pineapple’s story is a unique one, and worth reading for Souls fans and non-fans alike.

Patrick Klepek, Kotaku
More Klepek! This was is a doozy. Aparently, Doom fans can assembled a theory that links the narrative of every single game. A Doom cinematic universe, if you will. Who knows if the theory has any merit, but it was a great story to read. I love these kind of deep dives into video game lore, world building, and environmental storytelling.
The Impact Factor Ep. 56: Xbox Teraflopped
Podcast
Welcome to the 56th episode of The Impact Factor! The Impact Factor is what happens when two scientists, and two best friends, get together to talk about video games. Hosts Alex Samocha [biomedical scientist] and Charles Fliss [social scientist] sit down every week to discuss the week in gaming! Listen in for the news, views, and games that made the biggest impact!

Please send your suggestions and feedback to: impactfactorpodcast@gmail.com

In this episode Alex and Fliss talk about E3 2016, Xbox Scorpio, No Man’s Sky delay, Supercell, Uncharted 4, Oculus VR, Prey 2, F2P whales, Overwatch, and much more!

“New insights into the spending patterns of whales” by Mark Robinson, Gamasutra


YouTube page

For articles and reviews from Alex, check out: www.theimpactfactor.blogspot.com
For a blog about Japan, pop culture & more from Fliss, check out:
www.flissofthenorthstar.blogspot.com

Follow Alex @alexsamocha on Twitter. twitch.tv/megalodonphd
Follow Fliss 
@thecfliss on Twitter. twitch.tv/flissofthenorthstar

Intro song:
You Kill My Brother by Go! Go! Go! Micro Invasion, East Jakarta Chiptunes Compilations. Freemusic Archive. (Attribution Noncommercial Share-Alike License)
Transitions:
News & Views and Perspectives transitions from victorcenusa, Freesound.org (Creative Commons 0 License)
Experimental Methods transition from Sentuniman, Freesound.org (Attribution Noncommercial License)

Tuesday, May 24, 2016

Greatness From Small Beginnings
Review
Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End, Naughty Dog (PS4)

Abstract: Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End is a fantastic send off to one of PlayStation’s marquee franchises. Naughty Dog is peerless at crafting cinematic narrative adventures and their skill shines through in Uncharted 4. The game tells a more nuanced narrative than previous entries, filled with great character moments, dialogue, and themes that resonate throughout your experience. Uncharted 4 features smart improvements to nearly all gameplay systems, from more rewarding combat to more thrilling platforming. Uncharted 4 will no doubt be a highlight of 2016 and is easily one of my favorite games this year.

Sic parvis magna. “Greatness from small beginnings.” These are the words that accompanied the intrepid Nathan Drake throughout his five game journey. The words ring true for the franchise as a whole. Naughty Dog had accrued trust with their earlier titles, Crash Bandicoot and Jak and Daxter, but hadn’t really made it into the hall of the ‘greats’. Their first outing on the PS3, Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune, looked to propel the studio to new heights. The jaw-dropping Uncharted 2 all but solidified their claim. Nearly a decade after the series began, Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End marks the conclusion to the widely-acclaimed series. And what an ending it was.

I apologize in advance for a bit of hyperbole here, but Uncharted 4 is the best action movie I’ve ever played. Uncharted 4 builds upon the series’s past successes meaningfully, draws inspiration from its contemporaries, and delivers a nuanced adventure that is not only satisfying in its own right but confidently concludes Nathan Drake’s adventures.

Uncharted 4 takes place several years after the conclusion of the previous game. We find Nathan Drake living a quiet life, working salvage and stamping papers behind a desk. The game’s story revolves around Sam Drake, Nathan’s older brother (whom we had never heard of before). You quickly discover that Sam is not as dead as Nathan thought, and that he is in desperate need of Nathan’s help. Sam needs to finish an adventure the two started over 15 years ago – finding the legendary pirate Henry Avery’s long lost treasure. We follow their quest around the world, following hidden clues, solving deadly puzzles, fighting against an entire militia who wants the treasure for themselves, and for the first time, introspection. Uncharted 4’s narrative is more than just setpieces and globetrotting; it’s about Nathan Drake and the life he has led up to this point. Uncharted 4 is not a standalone adventure. Moreso than any Uncharted game before it, Uncharted 4 is a direct sequel to the narrative threads laid out by its predecessors. It’s for this fact that I want to clarify right now that you should not play Uncharted 4 before playing the previous Uncharted games. You will miss out on too much, from call backs to character moments.

Welcome to the end of a great adventure.
In reading other reviews, I’ve seen the word “mature” being tossed around to describe Uncharted 4’s story. Maturity is a complex and abstract concept, so I want to avoid using it here. Uncharted 4’s plot, however, is more nuanced than previous entries. It has a depth, mostly via a real exploration of its character’s motivations and personalities, that made what happens feel more substantive. As much as I loved Nathan from previous adventures, he was a pretty one note character – a quippy ubermensch. He was the fun-having, joke-cracking, bad guy-killing treasure hunter we all know from pulp fiction. In Uncharted 4, though, we’re given a more nuanced view of Drake. Why is he the way he has been in previous games? What motivates his treasure hunting? What makes him uncomfortable with normal life? Is Nathan Drake a good person? This exploration of character extends to many of the game’s supporting cast, from Sam to Elena to Sullivan. Character development is bolstered by Uncharted 4’s decision to pair Nathan up with a partner throughout the game. Similar to what we saw in The Last of Us, this partnering allowed for fantastic back and forths between characters (made even better by the game’s great writing). Perhaps the biggest compliment I can give the story is this: it never felt secondary to the action or setpieces. Uncharted 3 in particular felt like it wanted cool moments above all, and made a story to support their inclusion. In Uncharted 4, everything is about the end of Nathan’s adventure and his relationships to the people who know him best. Uncharted 4 wraps up Nathan Drake’s adventures in a deeply satisfying way.
 
There are action setpieces to be found, of course, but Uncharted 4
 always puts the characters and narrative first.
I appreciated the layers present in Uncharted 4’s narrative, too. The game is more than just one last adventure for a famous treasure hunter and his long lost brother. Uncharted 4 comments on the very nature of chasing impossible dreams. Nathan Drake’s last adventure is scaffolded with characters, and collectibles, that serve as an allegory for his arc. Essentially every character in the game, alive or dead, is a reflection of one of Nathan’s qualities. The overarching theme to the game is the cost of ambition. Naughty Dog does a phenomenal job at reinforcing this theme throughout, while avoiding clichés. For example, Uncharted 4 has phenomenal environmental storytelling. The world, and the collectibles within, offer side narratives and characters that meaningfully add to the story taking place at the game’s surface. Repeat playthroughs would no doubt further elucidate Uncharted 4’s dense narrative world, which makes me respect it all the more.
 
Where is the line between greed and ambition? What is
worth losing in pursuit of treasure?
Uncharted 4 is not just narrative, however. There is a whole lot to like about the gameplay. Uncharted 4 is a wonderful optimization of the franchise’s gameplay. Combat saw across the board improvements. For the first time, shooting felt asterisk-free “good.” Guns sound and look and aim like you would expect them to. Each weapon has an identity, which was great, as low ammo meant you constantly have to use whatever you can find. Enemy encounters feel handcrafted in the best possible way, giving players a dynamic environment that favors mobility and shifting tactics over hiding behind one piece of cover for the entire fight. Stealth has been improved, making it viable to silently take out the majority of your foes. Uncharted 4 added several quality of life features to combat as well. For players who want to engage with the story, but aren’t great at aiming, the game offers an auto-lock on feature that can be toggled on or off at any time. All enemies can be marked, giving players the tools to better plan their attack. On top of all that, Uncharted 4’s enemies are the least bullet sponge-y than they have ever been. Even on the hardest difficulty enemies go down with a few well-placed shots. This not only reinforces player skill but keeps the game’s momentum moving forward at all times.

Platforming, another essential part of Uncharted, has seen similar across the board improvements. The animations in this game are incredible, reinforcing the physicality of both the world and characters as you jump and climb your way around. Navigating through the environments has been made decidedly less constrained. Uncharted 4 offers several paths for players to take to get from A to B, from its more open environments down to even the handholds or ledges themselves. It removes the feeling of being shuttled down a corridor, enhancing immersion. Uncharted 4 introduces a series first handful of truly open environments. You have a set objective, but are free to wander and explore beautifully detailed and wide-open spaces. These are hit and miss, unfortunately. I enjoyed the sense of discovery and the great dialogue that happened while exploring, but overall the environments felt a bit too large (& too empty) to be worth scouring. A minor gripe to be sure, as you don’t spend long in any of these settings, but one that could have been tweaked to improve the player experience.
 
Encounters encourage mobility and experimentation.
No more being trapped behind chest high cover!
Puzzles make their return, of course, and are better than ever. For a game that so heavily relies on narrative momentum, puzzles can be a risky proposition. You don’t want the player to torture themselves trying to figure out something overly complex. Nor do you want them to be so easy they might as well have not been there. Uncharted 4 straddles this boundary perfectly. Some puzzles are more successful than others, but for the most part, all are just hard enough and just quick enough that I felt both satisfied to have solved it and happy to move forward. One puzzle in particular, found at the end of the game (symbols on floor squares), is now a franchise favorite of mine. Serious Indiana Jones vibes in all the right ways.
 
You won't be scratching your head too long trying to solve Uncharted 4's
puzzles. Which is great!
The biggest change to the Uncharted gameplay formula, rather than just refinements, is the addition of the rope. Nathan and his brother come equipped with a grappling hook-tipped rope that they use liberally throughout their adventure. The rope’s inclusion is odd at first, since Nathan was never previously the Tarzan type, but it eventually clicked and added a nice new layer to playing. Hilariously, its inclusion is even explained through the narrative. Swinging from cliff edge to cliff edge adds tension to platforming. Swinging around in the open air creates some beautiful vistas. Last minute hooking onto distant structures is built into some of the game’s best setpieces. The rope also adds to the dynamism of combat. Several of the game’s combat encounters have rope points, allowing you to swing action movie style from building to building, firing upon foes from midair. All it took was one dramatic midair headshot from my AK-47 to melt away all my rope skepticism. It’s a great addition.

It's hard not to grow attached to the rope. Moment-to-moment or action setpiece,
the rope is consistently fun.
As I mentioned on our podcast, Naughty Dog is peerless in the industry. No one can deliver gripping cinematic narrative adventures like they can. One of the ways in which they solidify their number one spot is just how fantastically detail oriented the team is there. Tender love and care bleed through every corner of Uncharted 4. For starters, Uncharted 4 is probably the most graphically stunning game I’ve ever seen. Character models, facial expressions, physics, environments: Uncharted 4 is jaw-droppingly gorgeous. I honestly do not even know how they do it. Uncharted 4 looks better than other games running at max specs on several thousand dollar PCs. It’s crazy.  The TLC goes much further than looks, though. Everything in the game is scripted well, reacts naturally, and feels real. The game has a ton of extra features and accommodations to players of all skill levels, interest levels, and engagement. Upon beating the game you unlock a wealth of content, including game modifiers (like spawning guns or bullet time mode) to aesthetic features (like a full 8-bit mode) to unlocking specific encounters for players to replay. The game’s epilogue in particular showcases how much Naughty Dog cares about its characters, its world, and its fans. Uncharted 4 is a rich game.

My eyes welled up with tears when I set the controller down at the end of my adventure. Uncharted is always a series I liked, but after A Thief’s End, it’s now a series I love. Nathan Drake is definitively done adventuring, so I guess I have to be too. It was great seeing him through his fantastic adventure, and I’m thrilled that Uncharted got a perfect send off with Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End. I’ll miss you, buddy.

Uncharted 4: A Thief’s End
5/5

Monday, May 23, 2016

TIF Plays: Week of 5/16-5/20
Gameplay

Welcome to the The Impact Factor's last week of gameplay! Check out below to links of all my gameplay. Be sure to catch me live on Twitch (MegalodonPhD). I stream every Tuesday at 5:30pm PST and Thursday at 6:30pm PST. Plus some special Friday streams, too! You can do me a favor by subscribing to The Impact Factor's YouTube channel, but hey, don't let me tell you what to do! 

To keep up to date with everything The Impact Factor, and me, follow me on Twitter: @alexsamocha

See you all next week!


Friday, May 20, 2016

News & Views
5/14/16-5/20/16

This week has been pretty incredible. I still can’t believe I got to play, and finish, Uncharted 4. What a game. Expect a review here next Tuesday. And there’s so much more! Survivor’s finale, warm weather, and the promise of summer fun has me feeling great. Now onto the real meat of the post.

News & Views collects the week’s best gaming editorials, opinions, and more into one convenient place. This week I found stories about the woman who invented cosplay, the grief of finishing a great video game (I’m feeling it with Uncharted 4), and the ever changing role of a game’s publisher in major eSports scenes. You should give them all a look and let me know which ones resonated with you!

And of course please check out the brand new episode of The Impact Factor podcast that was posted today! You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, or if you prefer other methods, check out our SoundCloud. We’re on YouTube too!

Spotlight
Keith Stuart, The Guardian

Worth Reading
Andrew Reiner, GameInformer

Sam Greszes, Kill Screen

Jennifer Culp, Racked

Patrick Miller, Giantbomb

Bryce Blum, ESPN

With Comments
Anthony Burch, Destructoid
Burch spotlights a problem not a lot of us think about – leveling systems. Visualizations of progression can be an extremely powerful hook in gaming, so much so that they can often impact how you play a game. Leveling in multiplayer modes specifically can create this terrible mind space, where you only are playing to level up. In certain games (RPGs) I quite enjoy leveling systems, but not every game needs gear you can strengthen, or player levels to increase. Great thoughts.

Nathan Ingraham, Engadget
Shortly after watching the high-octane trailer for Battlefield 1, I started to ponder the implications of what a World War I shooter would actually be. WWI was a terrible, brutal, bloody, inglorious and awful war. Battlefield is known for cartoonifying war so it felt odd that their team would try to depict WWI. I certainly “have the stomach” for Battlefield 1, but there is a lot to think about here.

Katherine Cross, Gamasutra
It might seem strange for me to spotlight Cross’s article here since The Impact Factor uses review scores, but I totally agree with the points she makes. Review scores, overall, are useless. Not only do they often say nothing, more often than not they stifle the conversation surrounding games (oh, it’s only a 7.5? Not worth my time). Scores can be helpful in establishing a certain kind of quality to a game, but they should not be the be all end all. I also went with a 5 star system here as to not play into the other terrible aspect of review scores – their inclusion in score aggregate sites. There is a lot to chew on here.

John Walker, RockPaperShotgun
John Walker’s article about whether or not you need to be good at games stimulated a lot of discussions online. On one hand, I agree with his title. You do not have to be good at games to enjoy them. But then again, I do think a certain level of competency is essential in reviewing games. Walker conflates this “GIT GUD” mentality for reviewers versus fans, but overall I quite liked the piece. People should never use skill at gaming to make someone feel like they don’t deserve to be playing. 
The Impact Factor Ep. 55: Uncharted Game Dev Territory
Podcast
Welcome to the 55th episode of The Impact Factor! The Impact Factor is what happens when two scientists, and two best friends, get together to talk about video games. Hosts Alex Samocha [biomedical scientist] and Charles Fliss [social scientist] sit down every week to discuss the week in gaming! Listen in for the news, views, and games that made the biggest impact!

Please send your suggestions and feedback to: impactfactorpodcast@gmail.com

In this episode Alex and Fliss talk about Disney Interactive, Twitch chat, eSports, WESA, Star Wars Battlefront 2, Civilization 6, Overwatch, game dev, Clash Royale, Uncharted 4 and much more!

CoolGamesInc. podcast


YouTube page

For articles and reviews from Alex, check out: www.theimpactfactor.blogspot.com
For a blog about Japan, pop culture & more from Fliss, check out:
www.flissofthenorthstar.blogspot.com

Follow Alex @alexsamocha on Twitter. twitch.tv/megalodonphd
Follow Fliss 
@thecfliss on Twitter. twitch.tv/flissofthenorthstar

Intro song:
You Kill My Brother by Go! Go! Go! Micro Invasion, East Jakarta Chiptunes Compilations. Freemusic Archive. (Attribution Noncommercial Share-Alike License)
Transitions:
News & Views and Perspectives transitions from victorcenusa, Freesound.org (Creative Commons 0 License)
Experimental Methods transition from Sentuniman, Freesound.org (Attribution Noncommercial License)

Tuesday, May 17, 2016

A Drop In The Bucket
Review
Risk of Rain, Hopoo Games (PS4/Vita)

Abstract: Despite sounding like a game tailor made for my gaming interests, Risk of Rain underwhelmed. Buried beneath slow platforming, mundane combat and an overreliance on finding the right items is a wealth of smart systems that demand a better moment-to-moment play experience. I appreciate Risk of Rain’s premise, aesthetics and world and wish that there were more to keep me playing. Despite my issues, however, I generally enjoyed my time with the game. Risk of Rain is not bad, I just wish it could have been better.  When looking at Risk of Rain as zoomed out as its in-game perspective is, I find enough there to recommend to enthusiasts of the genre.

Life and death is measured in pixels. The vast openness, and emptiness, of an alien planet is the only shelter for the sole survivor of a derelict spacecraft. Equipped with basic weapons and little else, your goal is simple: find some way off this deadly planet and stay alive. Turns out neither of those is as simple as they sound. Every action, every decision, carries some risk. Welcome to the world of Risk of Rain.

Risk of Rain started as a student project that grew into something much larger, the freshman outing for the independent studio Hopoo Games. The game, originally released in 2013, was met with critical success. Reading reviews got me excited too. A purchase of a Humble Bundle a couple years ago granted me a PC copy, but I never managed to get controller support to work and therefore never played it. Risk of Rain made its way to PlayStation consoles this May so I knew it was finally time to jump in. Was Risk of Rain all it was cracked up to be? Yes and no.

Risk of Rain is a 2D pixel art action platformer with randomized elements. The game is set in the distant future, in which space travel is common. At the start of the game your vessel, functionally a space train, meets a catastrophic fate—it’s blown to pieces by an alien attack. It turns out your ship was carrying some pretty special cargo, a mysterious piece of technology with untold power. The sole survivor of the attack, your character finds himself on a hostile alien planet. The setting serves as a compelling backdrop for the game at hand.

This strange alien world is a great backdrop for Risk of Rain.

When I saw that Risk of Rain is a platformer with randomized elements I got excited. Spelunky also fits that description and is one of my favorite games of all time. Unfortunately for Risk of Rain, it nails neither the platforming nor randomization in a thoroughly satisfying way. Your character moves incredibly slowly and has short jumps. It makes progressing through each stage a slog, as you know where you want to go but actually going there is slow and unfun. The slowness and heaviness is reinforced by Risk of Rain’s chosen perspective—the view is incredibly zoomed out. Your character is no more than a few pixels on a gigantic backdrop. I appreciate the mood this sets for the game, you do truly feel isolated and insignificant on a strange alien planet, but it reinforced the aesthetic at the expense of gameplay. The large environments only further drive in the fact that your character’s movement is just too stiff. Platforming doesn’t require precision or skill, just time. It’s not great.
 
That tiny little speck in the middle of the screen is my character.
Not that you could really tell.
During your journey throughout the level in search of the exit you’ll face off against a variety of alien foes that want nothing more to end your journey before it begins. Risk of Rain has a nice suite of baddies to combat: tiny lizard people, sky soaring jellyfish, ancient golems, giant ethereal humanoids. Each character you play has four attacks: one basic that can be used constantly, and three special that have cooldown periods after use. Your starting character, The Commando, has a long-range rifle to shoot at foes as well as a dodge roll, explosive shot and concussive fire. The Enforcer, another character, has a short-range shotgun, a riot shield, and a grenade. Playing each of the game’s 12 characters changes the way you approach combat and adds replayability to a game that can be beaten in about 45 minutes. Despite being only a couple pixels large, Risk of Rains cast of characters is replete with personality that lends itself to various play styles and types of players. I loved trying out each of the characters to figure out who best suited me.

Risk of Rain’s combat itself left a lot to be desired, however. Given that the platforming and exploration was not too fun, being let down by the combat felt all the worse. Basic attacks on the whole felt weak, taking many attacks to take down even the most basic of threats. This meant that you had to rely on your three special abilities to deal noteworthy damage. But because these have cooldowns I often found myself just running away from monsters until my abilities had recharged, which led to overlong encounters and a reinforcement of the game’s deliberate pace. Further, enemies chase you relentlessly with little means to escape their attacks. A few characters have mobility options or shields that prevent damage, but many others do not. Given little damage output, this design choice artificially inflates Risk of Rain’s difficulty. It isn’t fun to be swarmed to death with few means of countering the attack. My favorite play sessions happened when I turned the game’s difficulty down to easy, not because I don’t enjoy punishing games (because I do) but because it was the only difficulty in which combat felt fair. Difficult games that feel unfair to the player do not do “difficult” well.
 
Not a whole lot of ways to mitigate damage here. Especially not without
the right couple of items.
Items shape the majority of your experience in Risk of Rain. As you explore each stage, your character levels up and acquires money. Money can be used at stores, to open treasure chests, and on luck-based shrines found throughout the map. Items strengthen your character in various ways: some have passive effects like increasing health regeneration or dealing damage to enemies that come close to you, and others need to be activated, like an item that summons huge meteors down from the sky. There are things I liked about item design in the game. Items stack, increasing their effect or effectiveness, so every single one you find is useful. Acquiring a huge collection of items feels great, you go from a weak defenseless survivor into a wrecking ball of might and space magic. Some item effects are really clever and can single-handedly change the way you approach exploration and combat. Unfortunately, however, playthroughs in Risk of Rain are totally reliant on obtaining great item builds in order to succeed. I say without exaggeration that every single one of my good runs relied on finding an item called the Frost Relic. I had so many runs that I felt like giving up just because I had not found the right kind of items in the first stage or two. You will be overwhelmed by your enemies without the right setup. This creates a terrible problem, and one I have had with other item-reliant games like The Binding of Isaac. My skill should be able to get me from start to finish, items should just bolster my ability. That was never the case in Risk of Rain. It makes the player feel disempowered and like he or she is wasting their time on runs in which they don’t get lucky in finding the right items. 

Not items and fighting a boss? You're going to have a bad time. Slowly.
I wish Risk of Rain had a more enjoyable moment-to-moment play experience, because there are so many smart systems at play. The way in which Risk of Rain creates risk versus reward for exploration is brilliant. Every playthrough features a bar on the right side of the screen that starts empty and indicates “very easy.” The longer you play, the more that bar fills. The higher it gets, the higher the difficulty rises (more monsters, new monsters, tougher monsters). The system is genius in that it makes the player carefully consider how long they want to explore before moving on to the next level. Is it worth killing and exploring more to find more items, even though the monsters are getting progressively stronger the longer you take? If you want a successful run, is it better to speed through the levels or take your time to get the best build? It’s a push-pull that I wish scaffolded a more fun play experience. Risk of Rain also features some great secrets, the kind that make you want to keep coming back. From hidden artifacts, to new characters, Risk of Rain creates a world you want to learn more about. I love the idea of incorporating abilities with cooldowns into new genres (not just MOBAs and hero shooters), and I appreciate their inclusion here, even if they didn’t fit well into the game’s combat.

It is worth noting that Risk of Rain has an impressive presentation. Though small, the pixel art is incredibly detailed and vibrant. Enemies and characters alike have distinct personalities. The game’s backdrops are simple but feel perfectly alien. Risk of Rain’s gigantic end of level bosses are magnificent. The soundtrack is great, nailing that 80s sci-fi vibe that is found throughout the game. As a quick warning, however, playing Risk of Rain on the PlayStation Vita is not ideal. The zoomed out perspective on the Vita’s small screen does not work—to the point in which gameplay can become incomprehensible. Skip the Vita version.

I love the way Risk of Rain looks. I only wish I loved the way it played just as much. 
In the end, my review for Risk of Rain probably sounds more negative than it should. Looking back on my time with the game, it was a mostly enjoyable experience. There is a lot to like. So much of my criticism stems from how narrowly Risk of Rain missed for me. With a few tweaks Risk of Rain would be exceptional. A game I could play for dozens of hours. But it wasn’t, and I only played for 10 or so. Oh well. Risk nothing gain nothing, right?

Risk of Rain
3/5

Monday, May 16, 2016

TIF Plays: Week of 5/9-5/13
Gameplay

Welcome to the The Impact Factor's last week of gameplay! Check out below to links of all my gameplay. Be sure to catch me live on Twitch (MegalodonPhD). I stream every Tuesday at 5:30pm PST and Thursday at 6:30pm PST. Plus some special Friday streams, too! You can do me a favor by subscribing to The Impact Factor's YouTube channel, but hey, don't let me tell you what to do! 

To keep up to date with everything The Impact Factor, and me, follow me on Twitter: @alexsamocha

See you all next week!



Friday, May 13, 2016

News & Views
5/7/16-5/13/16

Hello and happy Friday! I know that I’m looking forward to the weekend, what about you? My last few have been relatively busy, so I can’t wait to just relax with the fiancée, watch some K Dramas, and play the heck out of Uncharted 4. It has been fantastic so far.

News & Views collects the week’s best writing about video games. Check out the links below to stories about the best hand animations in first-person games, the artists and art that inspired Dark Souls, an argument for better systems in place to stop racist Twitch chat, and an opus on Lionhead studio from origin to closure.

And of course please check out the brand new episode of The Impact Factor podcast that was posted today! You can subscribe to the podcast on iTunes, or if you prefer other methods, check out our SoundCloud. We’re on YouTube too!

Spotlight
Wesley Yin-Poole, Eurogamer

Worth Reading
Zack Kotzer, Kill Screen

Alex Wawro, Gamasutra

Gareth Damian Martin, Kill Screen

Chris Plante, The Verge

Patricia Hernandez, Kotaku

With Comments
Christopher Livingston, PC Gamer
What a fascinating spotlight article. Hand animations are an essential part of so many games today. In my experience I don’t tend to notice when they are bad, but holy cow do you notice when they are done well. One of 2016’s best games, Firewatch, features great hand animations. The article is worth reading for the gifs alone.

Carling Filewich, GosuGamers
I’ve had it with Twitch chat for large gaming tournaments. An unacceptable level of “trolling” i.e. racist, sexist, disgusting vitriol is allowed to happen. I was so excited to see TerrenceM play at Dreamhack this past weekend – and he was playing great. To see what was happening in the chat every time he was spotlighted made me sick to my stomach, though. Enough is enough. If Twitch users can’t responsibly chat, there shouldn’t be chat at all.

Alex Gilyadov, Paste
Alex Gilyadov presents some compelling arguments as to why you shouldn’t immediately write off the much-maligned Final Fantasy XII. I enjoyed playing XII contemporary to its release, but the game never really clicked with me. Do I think it is the most underrated game in the series? Actually? Maybe. There are several overrated Final Fantasy titles (VIII comes to mind), but not too many that are underrated. So congrats, Final Fantasy XII. At least you have that going for you. (P.S. The Zodiark fight is still bullcrap)

Philippa Warr, RockPaperShotgun
Philippa Warr’s piece on RPS is the Dark Souls of articles. Haha, joking. I, too, am guilty of describing things as the “Dark Souls of ____.” Warr’s comedic take on this now common gaming jargon is great and well worth reading. Not that I agree with all her points, of course. But I supposed I couldn’t fully agree, since The Impact Factor is the Dark Souls of gaming blogs. Ok, sorry. That’s the last one I promise.